Undisciplined

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On reflection, we may have overstated the case in describing the Arkansas delegation of the House of Representatives as looking like a synchronized swimming team in its enthusiastic yet precise support of bad bills. Occasionally, one spots the ostentatious leg sticking out of the water at an inappropriate time. That would be Rep. Tom Cotton of Dardanelle, a flighty sort. It's not that he doesn't want to do wrong, it's that he sometimes has difficulty identifying the greater wrong so that he can get behind it.
The conventional wisdom in Arkansas and in Washington was that loyal Republicans should support the farm bill. Most Republicans fell loyally into line, including Arkansas's Crawford, Griffin and Womack. Cotton voted against it, following the wishes of the deep-pocketed, hard-hearted anti-tax groups that give him money. Although the bill cut food stamps, which help feed poor people, it didn't cut the stamps as much as Cotton and his friends would like. Cotton evidently believes he can prosper politically by voting against poor people in a poor state. With an inattentive electorate, it's worked before.

Arrests of protesters didn't deter U.S. Sens. John Boozman and Tom Cotton from enthusiastically endorsing Brett Kavanaugh's nomination to the U.S. Supreme Court. /more/

The Campaign Legal Center has complained to the Federal Election Commission that the NRA used a shell company to unlawfully coordinate spending to elect Tom Cotton and others to the Senate in 2014. /more/

Politico has taken a deep look at a mystery outfit that spent $19 million to shift three U.S. Senate seats to Republicans in 2014, including the successful effort by Tom Cotton to oust Sen. Mark Pryor. /more/

Is Sen. Tom Cotton backing off his push (illustrated above) to prevent the U.S. from doing business with the Chinese telcom ZTE. Donald Trump has been pushing for an arrangement with ZTE. /more/

The full-bore attack on Democratic 2nd District Congress candidate Clarke Tucker of Little Rock, almost five months before the election gives you some idea of how seriously Republicans take his challenge of U.S. Rep. French Hill, the Republican banker and Trump defender. UPDATE: Some Tucker supporters turned up today as it happened. /more/

Rachel Maddow reported on MSNBC last night that the Justice Department had requested — and the Defense Department agreed — military lawyers to handle the crush of immigration work on the border. How about adding some Arkies on the temporary duty list? /more/

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We're sad to report that Doug Smith has decided to retire. Though he's been listed as an associate editor on our masthead for the last 22 years, he has in fact been the conscience of the Arkansas Times. He has written all but a handful of our unsigned editorials since we introduced an opinion page in 1992.

Last week, Attorney General Dustin McDaniel became the first elected statewide official to express support for same-sex marriage. His announcement came days before Circuit Judge Chris Piazza is expected to rule on a challenge to the state's constitutional ban on same-sex marriage. Soon after, a federal challenge of the law is expected to move forward. McDaniel has pledged to "zealously" defend the Arkansas Constitution but said he wanted the public to know where he stood.

Remarking as we were on the dreariness of this year's election campaigns, we failed to pay sufficient tribute to the NRA, one of the most unsavory and, in its predictability, dullest of the biennial participants in the passing political parade.